Emi is ambivalent. She is five years old, losing her baby-fat and gaining the responsibilities of a kindergartener. At school she loves the thrill of being in “K,” though she is anxious over the newness of it all. At home, …

I am thirty-eight weeks pregnant. It is 98 degrees out, claustrophobically hot, and I am sweating as I cajole my three-year-old daughter up the steps to the building where my OB’s office is. “I don’t wanna go in there!” she …

People ask me all the time, when’s the third? My parents, my husband’s parents, parents of my children’s classmates. The third: the third baby, the person who would officially tip the balance of adult-child power, the seemingly logical step after …

At 5 a.m., I woke up to a horrible sound. It was like your most annoying roommate’s most annoying alarm clock on one of those mornings where your annoying roommate sleeps right through the blaring noise that’s waking up everyone …

I’m going to confess something that might sound shocking coming from a writer who often takes as her subject the complex and sometimes dark experience of mothering young children: Today was one of those incredible days where I just felt …

The first time I was pregnant, I had no idea what was going on. I was weepy over commercials, shaky and dizzy if I skipped breakfast, prone to sobbing over a paper jam in my printer or a fax that …

It’s bedtime, and Emi’s asking for a drink before she goes to sleep. But tonight her usual request is accompanied by a more ominous directive. “Mommy,” she says, her face solemn, “when you come back, we have to talk.” “Okay,” …

Empathy is a hard thing for a preschooler to understand. “Emi!” I snap as she deliberately shoves her baby brother to the floor while he walks by. “Nate was in my way!” she wails. “You need to think before you …

Mr. Rogers is on television. My daughter seems more interested in her blocks at the moment, but I have turned on the TV anyway, a bad habit, I’m sure. I remember my younger sister liking Mr. Rogers so much she …

Every night when I put Emi to bed, she asks me questions in the dark. She asks things like, “How do turtles eat if they don’t have teeth?” “How do ducks float when their feathers get wet?” “Why do people …

I happened to read a while back, in some book called Your Four-Year-Old: Wild and Wonderful (a follow-up to Your Three-Year-Old: Friend or Enemy), that the imaginary play of four-year-old girls often features more death and violence than that of …